


Lost SOULdier

by Sorrel_Oake



Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Character Study, I've always thought what Undyne says at the end of her lost SOUL fight is a little weak, References to Undertale Genocide Route, Undyne-centric, so here's... something different she might've said
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-04
Updated: 2019-07-04
Packaged: 2020-06-03 17:49:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 712
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19469038
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sorrel_Oake/pseuds/Sorrel_Oake
Summary: "I fought the warI fought the warI fought the warBut the war won"--"Metric", Monster HospitalWhen Frisk shows her mercy, does Undyne have it in her not to fight?





	Lost SOULdier

The human in front of her breathes in. Breathes out.

She has to kill them, has to has to has to. Has to keep Alphys safe, has to bring her people to the surface. The War is older than her, as old as Asgore, and its great old wheels need blood. For her to end human lives just to save monster lives. Since she was too young to carry a spear, that was how it had to be.

They’re saying something. Something familiar, words she can’t quite make out. She growls back at them. The War, the War is everything. “All humans WILL die!!!”

Her spear moves like lightning on the water. The wind is howling.

They’ve got a knife that cuts the air like butter. She’s seen it before, in Asgore’s house. The princen’s knife. They swing it, they swing it and slam it against her spear. The blow reverberates through her arms…

_ The wind is howling. _

_ There was a human. A human killing everyone. They killed her. They were going to kill Alphy, Alphys who did nothing wrong, brave timid Alphys who stuttered trying to ask her to sleep over but never hesitated before starting the evacuation. They were going to kill Father. They were going to kill everyone. _

_ Monsters… Humans too. Stupid beautiful humans with their beautiful stories and art, humans that made Alphys smile when she herself couldn’t.  _

_ Humans, on the other side of the War. If she went down now, and didn’t stand back up, Alphys would evacuate the monsters and this human would careen through the barrier and kill every human up there for her. The War would be over. They would have won. _

_ But who would she be? The person who condemned a whole species to die at the hand of one of their own. Humans had kids, innocents like Papyrus, right? The princen had been one those human innocents, from what she’d heard from the King. The same kind of innocents the murderer was cutting down.  _

_ Monsters… humans… EVERYONE. Everyone was waiting for her to choose. Kindness or victory? Bravery or cowardice? Peace or War? _

_ Damn the War. She was a hero, not a soldier. _

_ “For the sake of the whole world, I will strike you down!” _

She stares at the human. What had they done?! Who had they killed?! Papyrus? Alphys? Dad? “You’re our real enemy.”

The human watches and watches and watches. So quiet. It was awful. Her memories are slowly sliding back. How could she kill them, knowing they had spared everyone. They had done the opposite of that demon in her memories. They’re kind, happy, sweet, a child. No different than a monster child. No different. How could she kill them?

The War. That was how she could kill them, that was why she had to. She raises her spear, says the only creed she’d ever known. “Mercy is for the weak.”

A tear slides down the kid’s cheek. They gather themself, and Undyne braces for the strike. Now they would remember that the War was everything. Humans and monsters, at war for millennia, never dreaming of peace, only of victory.

They grin big instead, a small echo of the grin she gave them when she spared their life. Everything strikes her at once, their kindness, their open heart, the way they’d never even flinched away from a monster. There's no War in their SOUL, just a garden of hopes glowing golden like the dawn. 

She buckles, dropping to one knee, clinging to her spear to stay up. Tears fall unbidden from her eye. Frisk rushes to her, flinging their arm around her shoulders, and she sobs into their chest.

“I… I d-don’t want to have to hurt anybody anymore…” Her voice and her will break as she imagines it for the first time--a world without the War. Sitting with Alphys on the porch watching human kids and monster kids play together. No hate, no fear, just her people and Frisk’s coexisting, each under her protection. Each giving and receiving her kindness, the love trapped in a heart closed off by the War for too long but finally freed.

There’s a hand gently stroking her hair as she fades, no longer under anyone’s control but her own.

“You don’t.”


End file.
